Palazzo Chiaramonte-Steri
Palazzo Chiaramonte-Steri rises in Palermo as a Gothic palace with Arab and Norman details behind a plain façade. Built in 1307 by the powerful Chiaramonte family, it first served as their residence and later became a seat for Aragonese kings and viceroys.
The palace took a darker role in the seventeenth century, when it housed the Spanish Inquisition for almost two centuries. Its prison cells now form part of a museum, preserving poems, sonnets, graffiti, and drawings made by prisoners during confinement. A separate prison building added between 1603 and 1605 contained eight ground-floor cells and six upstairs, while restoration in 2005 uncovered ten more cells with surviving marks.
The Hall of the Barons holds a wooden ceiling covered with murals, offering a striking contrast to the prison walls. Some prisoners used coal or even blood to leave behind images of fear, anger, and faith.
- City
- Palermo
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The myTuur app is free, and once you are standing at a spot its story starts by itself.
Spots like this one are the stops myTuur strings into tours through Palermo. In the app, each story begins where you stand: walk up to a spot and it starts, read it on screen or listen as you go, then follow the route to the next one.
What is myTuur?
myTuur is a free city-guide app. Its tours are built from spots, and each spot carries a story that starts when you get there, to read or to listen to as you like.